Bird With A Broken Wing
by RubySoh
Summary: Everyone in the Last City and beyond knows the story of the Guardians, the soldiers whose path was set in the stars long before the Collapse. But what if the Light lived, burrowed away, in one of the living? What if her destiny came to claim her? And what if she changed everything?
1. Prologue

**A/N** : I've been rattling around with this multi-chapter thing since TTK days, and only recently got the gumption to actually post it. Set pre-TTK but after Dark Below. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

 _The inferno raged around them, belching smoke into the night._

 _"Where are the others?" Ger rasped._

 _"Right behind you."_

 _"Any idea what's happened here?"_

 _"'Fraid not. That's for you to find out."_

 _"Hook me in."_

 _Ger took a tentative step into the chaos, hand outstretched, as his Ghost wired in the comms. His fingers were burning through his gloves, but it didn't seem to be getting worse._

 _"...at's happening, boss?"_

 _"Stay close," Ger said. "Both of you. Watch for – "_

 _Something slammed into his leg. His gun was in his hands before he'd even fully registered the impact, Arc energy sparking in the pads of his fingers._

 _"Light!" He barked. His Ghost immediately obliged._

 _He nearly dropped the rifle._

 _The child squinted at him. Skinny arms and legs, hair braided, body wrapped in what looked like animal skins and covered from heat to to in Ger could say anything, the barrel of a gun appeared at his shoulder. The little girl let out a thin wail and promptly wet herself._

 _"It's a kid, Takaala!" Ger snapped, knocking the gun away._

 _"Don't be ridiculous, Ger." Algoth said. "Nothing could have survived this. You can smell the burning - "_

 _"That's plenty." Ger cut him off. Before he could overthink it, he released his helmet with a hiss and pulled it off._

 _"Have you lost your mind?" Takaala gaped._

 _"Where's your family, little one?" He said, ignoring the Warlock._

 _"Ger – "_

 _"P-please," she said, visibly quivering._

 _"Ger, that's – "_

 _"Please don't k-k-kill me."_

 _"Ger, I think she's a Nightcr – "_

 _"Enough!" He snapped over his shoulder. The child wilted, eyes flicking between them._

 _"It's alright." Ger said quickly. "I'm not going to hurt you." He smiled in what he hoped was a reassuring way and took a tiny step towards her._

 _She didn't move._

 _"Where's your family?"_

 _Wordlessly, she pointed into the depths of the inferno. Ger felt his guts plummet. And speaking of guts, he thought, she was clutching at her abdomen, white knuckles visible through the soot coating her hands._

 _"You hurt, little one?"_

 _"Magpie."_

 _"Magpie?"_

 _"That's my name," she croaked. "Magpie."_

 _"Huh."_

 _As gently as he could Ger plucked his Mark from his hip, ignoring Takaala's noise of dissent behind him._

 _"Can I see?"_

 _Magpie's trembling hands were coated with blood, dried and fresh, as she lifted them away from the dark spot near her waist. Ger folded the Mark once and once again and handed it to her._

 _"Here," he said. "Press that on, and don't let up until the bleeding stops. Can you stand?"_

 _Magpie shook her head and promptly burst into tears. Ger's decision was made for him._

 _"We're going," he said sharply to his Fireteam, ignoring their mutinous expressions. He snapped his helmet back on and scooped Magpie into his arms, where she howled and thrashed as though he'd set her ablaze._

 _"Can you shut her up?" Takaala muttered irritably into the comms as they started to walk. "She'll give us away if we're not careful."_

 _"You're all heart, Takaala."_

 _"If you think I'm going to - "_

 _"I'll fight you," Magpie said suddenly, with a surprising amount of venom for a child. "If you try to kill me, I'll fight you. I'm not scared."_

 _"Why on Earth would we try to kill you?" Ger said._

 _"Because you're a Guardian." She said, as if this was the most obvious thing in the world._

 _"So?"_

 _An explosion rattled the air around them and Magpie shrank back into his arms._

 _"It's getting heavy out here, boss." Algoth said grimly into his ear. "We need you._

 _"I'll be with you in a second," Ger said heavily. He lowered Magpie gently to the ground and she grabbed his hand, tiny fingers curling around his own._

 _"It's not safe here, Magpie." he said gently. "Are your family evacuating?"_

 _"What's that mean?"_

 _"Leaving," he said grimly. "Heading to where it's safe."_

 _"I d-don't know," Magpie hiccuped. "I don't know where M-Mama is."_

 _Ger felt an iron fist of misery clench around his heart. The village burned around them._

 _Trying not to let his face betray him, he looked for shelter. The land outside the City wall was notoriously mountainous and wild, but his immediate surroundings were flat and tilled. Farmland. How had they never spotted farmland?_

 _"How well do you know the countryside, Magpie?" He said slowly._

 _She shrugged, one thumb in her mouth._

 _He knelt so he was level with her head. "I need you to find somewhere to hide, kid. You hear me? Fast as you can. Keep still, and don't come out until it's quiet. Do you understand?"_

 _She nodded and took a couple of hesitant steps forward, before stopping with a contemplative look. She peeled the Mark away from her side carefully and offered it to him._

 _Ger chuckled and pushed her cold little hands back. "Keep it. Remember we're not all monsters."_

 _Her face split into a wide smile, the first Ger had seen._

 _"Thanks, mister," she said, and took off into the smoke. Grief unfurled in Ger's chest. She was tiny. Alone._

 _And what were humans doing out here anyway?_

 _"Alright team," he said down the comms, fighting to keep his voice steady. "What's our - "_

 _The burst was so violent it narrowed his sound, his vision down to a pinprick, slamming him into the ground, forcing the air from his lungs. Scrabbling among the dirt for his weapon, Ger hauled his breaths in. Dirt scratched his eyes as he blinked, trying to find clarity in the chaos._

 _When he found it, he would have given it up again in an instant._

 _Six enormous metal legs. One monstrous body. Fallen everywhere, screaming into the night._

 _No sign of Algoth or Takaala._

 _A horrible, grinding noise next to him made him jump. His blood froze. The flickering, blue eye of his Ghost gazed at him from the dirt._

 _"I'm sorry," it said faintly, and flickered out._

 _Ger looked up to meet the turret of the Walker as it turned, impossibly slowly, to face him._

 _Run fast, little one, he thought grimly, as fire took over._


	2. I

**FORTY YEARS LATER**

Magpie launched herself over the edge of the cliff. Her hands barely grazed the stone, catching tufts of grass and well-worn ridges. She knew the rock face better than she knew the surface of her own body, every slight undulation in carved by her own fingertips over decades until she could scale it without thought.

Which was just as well. Right now there wasn't time to think.

A stream of bullets peppered the rock. Her grasp slipped; she lunged furiously for a handhold but her fingers closed around smooth stone. The ground came up fast and she landed harder than she'd intended, stumbling into the undergrowth and throwing herself onto her front.

She was exhausted, she was starving, and it was showing.

She lay still, panting, as yells filtered down from the cliff. Anger exploded in her tired veins, flaring and dying like an exploding star. She couldn't even hunt these days without running into a pack of Guardians. They danced on her life the way they had danced on the remnants of her village, the bastards.

Her hand went unconsciously to the cloth knotted around her neck.

 _Keep it, kid. Remember we're not all monsters._

She had wanted to believe.

 _help me help me_

As quickly as it had arrived her anger ebbed away, leaving a vacant, empty space where she suspected her soul might have been. The bleak, washed-out aftermath of a tidal wave. She cycled through grief, resignation, the desire for vengeance, but none of them really touched her any more. Not after forty years.

Numb and hungry, she flipped onto her back with a heavy sigh and let her eyes drift closed.

The air was warm. She felt heavy, somewhere between sleep and consciousness. The breeze lifted her hair slightly, making her shiver as it hit the sweat on her neck. There was a loud explosion in the distance. Undergrowth crackled around her.

Voices.

In one movement she rolled into a crouch, completely awake, perfectly still in the undergrowth. She held her breath; attuned to every molecule of air, she could almost feel the movements of the forest on the surface of her tongue, racketing through her ears.

"...secure the perimeter. Kill any you see on sight."

"Yes, my lord."

 _Kill on sight._

Magpie's heart started to thump harder in her chest as she

 _they're killing us no please stop_

crept forward with practised precision, testing her steps briefly to make sure they were sound. Her hand went to the knife at her belt, fingertips buzzing above it, ready to go when her adrenaline snapped.

 _help me_

She knew Guardians couldn't die, but they could feel pain. She could be gone before they even knew she was there. She was a Nightcrawler, born with cold wind and colder sunrises in her veins. The Wilds were her home, her beast.

Fury and venom and fear fought for dominance in her chest. It was always kill on sight with them, the bastards.

 _help them they're killing them ger where are you_

The leaves thrashed in front of her and something grabbed her wrist impossibly tightly; there was a terrific crack and pain shot up her arm, blinding her. She lashed out unthinkingly with her other hand, and her fist connected painfully something hard.

Whatever it was dropped her back into the mud, but before she could scramble to her feed she was hauled up unceremoniously by the scruff of her neck. She roared and lashed out with both legs, until she caught a look at her assailant and promptly dried up inside.

"Who the hell are you?" He demanded.

He was enormous, well over a full head taller than Magpie with arms the size of her abdomen and thick armour that made him look like a monster. His face was completely obscured by a colossal horned helmet, with one horn snapped off at the base. Bile and acid at the base of her gut as she dangled, helpless as a stuck fish.

They were surrounded by identical, gun-wielding soldiers. Entirely metal.

"Let me go," she rasped. To her surprise, he obliged. They stared at each other in silence.

"Why are you here?" He said suspiciously when she didn't volunteer any information "Only Guardians are to leave the City boundary."

Magpie swallowed painfully past her dry tongue.

"Go on, then." She said bitterly. "Put me out of my misery."

There was a long, tense pause. Magpie stared unflinchingly into the faceless helmet of the Guardian.

"Listen, whoever you are," he said. "I have authorisation to secure this area for arena use - "

"Kill me then." She was shouting now, thumping her chest. "Kill me like you did my parents, my people, you cowards, you bloody awful cowards - "

The Guardian promptly grabbed her by the front of her jacket so forcefully he knocked the breath out of her.

"What are you?" He snarled.

"I'm the last one." She said bluntly.

"The last one?"

"This is my home. You took everything away from me one night forty summers ago."

"I'm going to –"

"Oh, catch me and see if I care," Magpie snapped, and before he or his robot comrades could respond she launched back herself into the undergrowth. Shouts followed her and she swerved from side to side in case they started to shoot, but the voices faded in the wind.

The pain in her wrist eventually brought her to her knees, and she examined it gingerly. Bright purple, swollen, excruciating. She spat on the ground. How was she supposed to hunt with a broken wrist?

She couldn't be bothered to consider it. Slumped against a tree trunk, the heavy splatter of rain began on the leaves above her head. She was hungry, she was tired, she had nowhere to be.

 _mama, are you there?_

 _It's your mag-pag. I'm lost, mama._


	3. II

His bad leg throbbed insistently, he'd failed to get his arena, Cayde-6 wanted to speak to him, and when he returned to the Tower there was a familiar Titan hovering awkwardly next to his desk. All in all, Lord Shaxx was not having a good day.

"What is it?" He said wearily. The Titan – Braco, he thought his name was – jumped. He was paler than radiolarian fluid, and Shaxx was visited by sudden desire to grab him by his shoulder plates and shake him until he got a grip.

"C-Cayde said I should speak to you, Sir."

"And what exactly does Cayde want?"

"He said I should ask you if you'd train me. One on one." Braco said quickly, as if he thought this information might be more palatable that way. Shaxx felt his fist clench.

It was easy to visualise Braco in the Crucible. Sweat beading on his pale face, eyes screwed up in anticipation of a bullet. Trembling with fear, frozen in place. He was perpetually leaning to one side, as though he half-expected to be forced to run for his life at any moment. Shaxx knew, rationally, he should be sympathetic to the anxieties of Guardians. It wasn't an easy life. He knew that as well as anyone.

Unfortunately, he wasn't feeling particularly rational.

"You know, Titan," he said. "When I look at you, and I remember that every punch a Titan throws comes with intention and purpose, a little part of me dies to see you care so little".

"I - "

"I have people like you who can win wars, Titans who could build all seven columns and shake the pillars to their core. I have tried to train you in combat, the Vanguard have given you opportunities in the field. What use is a Guardian who won't fight? Who weeps at the first sign of aggression?"

What little colour was left in Braco's face drained away. He clearly didn't think anyone had seen his little performance in Exodus Blue that morning.

"What do you think the Crucible is, Titan?"

"It's...your arena?"

 _His arena. His life's work. His distraction._

"I'll tell you what it isn't," Shaxx said, pushing those thoughts away. "It's not a game. It's not a nursery. It's war. Nobody's going to hold your hand in the field. I'm certainly not going to waste my time doing it here."

There was a long silence.

"I've never failed, Guardian," Shaxx said finally, his voice harsh. "All these years. I've taught arrogant Hunters and Warlocks who think too much and I've never failed. I'm not about to start now."

 _His revenge. His atonement._

"Do better. Earn it. And you can tell Cayde next time he wants me to pander to someone to ask me himself."

Braco almost sprinted out of the hall, stumbling over his own feet as he went. Shaxx could have sworn he heard a strangled sob as he left, and he drove his fist into the desk with a grunt.

He'd never failed. There would never be another Twilight Gap.

Nobody else would lose what he had lost.

* * *

 _The fire had been burning forever, swallowing up the ground before dying slowly into embers and stray flames. She'd stayed until it was quiet, just like Ger told her, watching wide-eyed until the heat made them dry and scratchy._

 _When the only sound and movement was the last of the flames she took a step out into the field. And another._

 _She was a Nightcrawler, Mama had reminded her just the other day. No matter how many times the City dwellers spat on them, shunned them, kept them out, the bravest and most noble thing to do was live. To keep going._

 _Another step. And another._

 _The village was gone. Burned out husks of wood and dirt houses, a funny smell that made her wrinkle her nose. There was nobody there._

 _"Mama?" She called out in a wavering voice, and coughed violently as the hot air seared her throat._

 _Nobody answered. No hand came round to claim her._

 _She padded on. The Matriarch hut was a shell, the market stalls nothing but charred splinters, but it was the totem in the centre of the square that made her whimper with fear. She'd loved to run her fingers along the carved lines and symbols, tracing the faces of the spirits. Now it was blasted away from the base, jagged wood sticking out of the ground like ugly teeth._

 _A series of loud bangs made her squeak and she fell to her knees trembling._

 _"Mama?"_

 _Be brave be brave be brave be_

 _She inched around the charred remains of huts and saw the heavy outline of figures through the smoke. She froze._

 _Guardians._

 _Magpie hesitated. Ger was nowhere to be see, but she recognised the armour of one of his friends. Takaala, was her name? She hadn't been friendly, but maybe she knew where Ger was…_

 _Mind made up, she crept through the smoke, mindful of Takaala's mood when they'd first met. But the Guardian was laughing now, laughing and waving one of the torches from the crumbled village gate, sparks bursting into the air like fireflies. She was shouting at someone under the shattered wood of the markethouse, and - yes! There were screams and banging noises from underneath. Magpie's heart leapt in her chest. Someone was in there, alive, she wasn't alone, they were to be rescued…_

 _She started to run towards them, full of hope - maybe Mama was there! - but before she could make her way out of the shadows Takaala threw her head back with a roar of triumph, monstrous in the flickering firelight._

 _Magpie watched in horror as she dropped the torch. It thudded down the pyre, bouncing once, twice, before flames roared over the wood. There were no more screams after that._


End file.
